Origin of Species Variorum

→ to a favourable spot 1859 1860 1861 1866 1869

OMIT 1872

→ they 1859 1860 1861 1866 1869

to a favourable spot, 1872

→ floated 1859 1860 1861 1866 1869

of different kinds floated 1872

→ could hardly be transported by any other means; and 1859 1860 1861 1866 1869

which, as 1872

→ that such plants 1859 1860 1861 1866 1869

OMIT 1872

→ ranges. 1859 1860 1861 1866 1869

ranges, could hardly be transported by any other means. 1872

per diem); on this average, the seeds of 14/100 plants belonging to one country might be floated across 924 miles of sea to another

country,

country;

and when stranded, if blown →to a favourable spot by an inland

gale

gale,

→they would germinate.

Subsequently to my experiments, M. Martens tried similar ones, but in a much better manner, for

placed the seeds in a box in the actual sea, so that they were alternately wet and exposed to the air like really floating plants. He tried 98 seeds, mostly different from mine; but he chose many large fruits and likewise seeds from plants which live near the sea; and this would have favoured

both the

the

average length of their flotation and

their resistance to the injurious action of the salt-water. On the other

hand,

hand

he did not previously dry the plants or branches with the fruit; and this, as we have seen, would have caused some of them to have floated much longer. The result was that

1/9 8/8

18/98

of his seeds →floated for 42 days, and were then capable of germination. But I do not doubt that plants exposed to the waves would float for a less time than those protected from violent movement as in our experiments. Therefore it would perhaps be safer to assume that the seeds of about 10/100 plants of a flora, after having been dried, could be floated across a space of sea 900 miles in width, and would then germinate. The fact of the larger fruits often floating longer than the small, is

in- teresting;

interesting;

as plants with large seeds or fruit →could hardly be transported by any other means; and Alph. de Candolle has

shown,

shown

→that such plants generally have restricted →ranges.

~~But~~

But

Seeds

seeds

may be occasionally transported in another manner. Drift timber is thrown up on most islands, even on those in the midst of the widest oceans; and the natives of the coral-islands in the

Pacific

Pacific,

procure